More colleges are abandoning the long lines and hard plastic trays in favor of more sleek, modern dining facilities.

Brett Carlsen | MLive.comMembers of the Kettering community test the complimentary cuisine during the grand opening of the new cafeteria. Kettering University unveils its new cafeteria in response to student concerns for a more modern cuisine on campus.

Kettering University Thursday held a grand opening for their redesigned cafeteria. Essentially, the university has added more places to get food, different kinds of food and different kinds of tables and chairs.

"We felt this space needed to be brought into the 2000s," said Greg Lepore, district manager at Sodexo, the company which provides dining services for the university and helped with the redesigned space.

The updates are designed to provide an area students can get more uses out of. Need to meet with a study group of 12? There's a spot for that. Need to sit alone and plug in a laptop? Spot for that, too.

Kettering and Sodexo officials point to the changes as getting in line with a national trend in higher education dining facilities.

The idea for the upgrades came from conversations with students and new university president, Robert McMahan.

McMahan, by his own accounts, eats in the cafeteria alongside the students.

Kettering students spend roughly half their time at college working with a company in a co-op job.

"Many of the conversations I ave with our students, they say 'you know, we go to out co-op program and we have these dining options there. Then we come back here and we don't have that,'" McMahan said.

Construction for the upgrades took about three weeks, which took place during the end of June.